1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mounting information-collecting device, a connector, and a mounting information-collecting method, and more particularly, to a mounting information-collecting device for collecting mounting information concerning mounted statuses of respective circuit boards by using an optical signal, a connector for connecting each circuit board to a housing, and a mounting information-collecting method of collecting the mounting information concerning the mounted statuses of the respective circuit boards by using the optical signal.
2. Description of the Related Art
When a circuit board is received in a housing, faulty mounting of the circuit board can occur e.g. due to incomplete insertion of the same into the housing. Visual confirmation by human eyes is unreliable and ineffective in finding such faulty mounting of a circuit board.
For this reason, there was proposed a device which is capable of detecting faulty mounting of a circuit board mechanically without resorting to human eyes alone for confirmation. FIG. 12 shows the arrangement of the conventional circuit board mounted status-detecting device. The conventional circuit board mounted status-detecting device 200 is comprised of a housing 201, circuit boards 202a to 202n, and a monitoring block 203.
The circuit boards 202a to 202n have respective connectors Cpa to Cpn arranged thereon, and the monitoring block 203 has a connector Cp arranged thereon. On the other hand, the housing 201 has connectors Cfa to Cfn and Cf arranged thereon in a manner corresponding to the respective connectors Cpa to Cpn and Cp. In FIG. 12, the monitoring block 203 has already been fitted into the housing 201.
The connectors Cpa to Cpn have respective contacts pa-1 to pn-1 connected to ground GND. On the other hand, the connectors Cfa to Cfn have respective contacts pa-2 to pn-2 corresponding to the contacts pa-1 to pn-1, and the contacts pa-2 to pn-2 are each pulled up by a resistor R within the monitoring block 203 via a corresponding one of signal lines Sa to Sn.
When the circuit boards 202a to 202n are fitted into the housing 201, the signal lines Sa to Sn are connected to ground GND via the contacts pa-1 to pn-1 and the contacts pa-2 to pn-2 connected respectively to each other.
Therefore, when the power is turned on after the circuit boards 202a to 202n are fitted into the housing 201, the voltage of each of the signal lines Sa to Sn arranged on a backboard of the housing 201 changes to a ground level (however, the voltage of a signal line on a portion of the housing 201 in which a circuit board is not mounted does not change to the ground level). The monitoring block 203 detects the voltage level of each of the signal lines Sa to Sn and determines, based on the detected voltage level, whether or not each of the circuit boards 202a to 202n is mounted.
However, in the above prior art, it is required to increase the number of signal lines Sa to Sn with an increase in the number of circuit boards to be mounted, which causes congestion of wiring on the backboard of the housing. Further, the number of input/output pins of a connector is limited, and hence the increase in the number of signal lines Sa to Sn results in shortage of pins of the connector of the monitoring block.
Moreover, in the prior art, although it is possible to detect whether or not a circuit board is mounted, when a mounted circuit board is suffering from a fault, it is impossible to locate the circuit board.